@ericg: "Dinan fails to research Paul Ehrlich - he is the lunatic academic who started the whole Apocalyptic
Green Religion. In 1968 he wrote The Population Bomb which predicted 100s of millions would did due
to resource depletion. He and John Holdren also lost the famous bet to Julian Simon by claiming
metal prices would rise, they dropped.
John McCarthy: <url>
Climate science will never be credible if they associate with religious nutts like Gore/Suzuki and
intellectual morons.
<url>
Stephen Dinan
Undaunted by a rash of scandals over the science underpinning climate change, top climate
researchers are plotting to respond with what one scientist involved said needs to be "an
outlandishly aggressively partisan approach" to gut the credibility of skeptics.
In private e-mails obtained by The Washington Times, climate scientists at the National Academy of
Sciences say they are tired of "being treated like political pawns" and need to fight back in kind.
Their strategy includes forming a nonprofit group to organize researchers and use their donations
to challenge critics by running a back-page ad in the New York Times.
"Most of our colleagues don't seem to grasp that we're not in a gentlepersons' debate, we're in a
street fight against well-funded, merciless enemies who play by entirely different rules," Paul R.
Ehrlich, a Stanford University researcher, said in one of the e-mails.
Some scientists question the tactic and say they should focus instead on perfecting their science,
but the researchers who are organizing the effort say the political battle is eroding confidence in
their work.
"This was an outpouring of angry frustration on the part of normally very staid scientists who
said, 'God, can't we have a civil dialogue here and discuss the truth without spinning
everything,'" said Stephen H. Schneider, a Stanford professor and senior fellow at the Woods
Institute for the Environment who was part of the e-mail discussion but wants the scientists to
take a slightly different approach.
The scientists have been under siege since late last year when e-mails leaked from a British
climate research institute seemed to show top researchers talking about skewing data to push
predetermined outcomes. Meanwhile, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the authoritative
body on the matter, has suffered defections of members after it had to retract claims that
Himalayan glaciers will melt over the next 25 years.
Last month, President Obama announced that he would create a U.S. agency to arbitrate research on
climate change.
Sen. James M. Inhofe, Oklahoma Republican and a chief skeptic of global-warming claims, is
considering asking the Justice Department to investigate whether climate scientists who receive
taxpayer-funded grants falsified data. He lists 17 people he said have been key players in the
controversy.
That news has enraged scientists. Mr. Schneider said Mr. Inhofe is showing "McCarthyesque" behavior
in the mold of the Cold War-era senator who was accused of stifling political debate through
accusations of communism.
In a phone interview, Mr. Schneider, who is one of the key players Mr. Inhofe cites, said he
disagrees with trying to engage in an ad battle. He said the scientists will never be able to
compete with energy companies.
"They're not going to win short-term battles playing the game against big-monied interests because
they can't beat them," he said.
He said the "social contract" between scientists and policymakers is broken and must be reforged,
and he urged colleagues to try to recruit members of Congress to take up their case. He also said
the press and nongovernmental organizations must be prodded.
"What I am trying to do is head off something that will be truly ugly," he said. "I don't want to
see a repeat of McCarthyesque behavior and I'm already personally very dismayed by the horrible
state of this topic, in which the political debate has almost no resemblance to the scientific
debate."
Not all climate scientists agree with forcing a political fight.
"Sounds like this group wants to step up the warfare, continue to circle the wagons, continue to
appeal to their own authority, etc.," said Judith A. Curry, a climate scientist at the Georgia
Institute of Technology. "Surprising, since these strategies haven't worked well for them at all so
far."
She said scientists should downplay their catastrophic predictions, which she said are premature,
and instead shore up and defend their research. She said scientists and institutions that have been
pushing for policy changes "need to push the disconnect button for now," because it will be
difficult to take action until public confidence in the science is restored.
"Hinging all of these policies on global climate change with its substantial element of uncertainty
is unnecessary and is bad politics, not to mention having created a toxic environment for climate
research," she said.
Ms. Curry also said that more engagement between scientists and the public would help - something
that the NAS researchers also proposed.
Paul G. Falkowski, a professor at Rutgers University who started the effort, said in the e-mails
that he is seeking a $1,000 donation from as many as 50 scientists to pay for an ad to run in the
New York Times. He said in one e-mail that commitments were already arriving.
The e-mail discussion began late last week and continued into this week.
Mr. Falkowski didn't respond to an e-mail seeking comment, and an effort to reach Mr. Ehrlich was
unsuccessful.
But one of those scientists forwarded The Times' request to the National Academy of Sciences, whose
e-mail system the scientists used as their forum to plan their effort.
An NAS spokesman sought to make clear that the organization itself is not involved in the effort.
"These scientists are elected members of the National Academy of Sciences, but the discussants
themselves realized their efforts would require private support since the National Academy of
Sciences never considered placing such an ad or creating a nonprofit group concerning these
issues," said William Kearney, chief spokesman for NAS.
The e-mails emerged months after another set of e-mails from a leading British climate research
group seemed to show scientists shading data to try to bolster their claims, and are likely to feed
the impression among skeptics that researchers are pursuing political goals as much as they are
disseminating science.
George Woodwell, founder of the Woods Hole Research Center, said in one e-mail that researchers
have been ceding too much ground. He blasted Pennsylvania State University for pursuing an academic
investigation against professor Michael E. Mann, who wrote many of the e-mails leaked from the
British climate research facility.
An initial investigation cleared Mr. Mann of falsifying data but referred one charge, that he
"deviated from accepted practices within the academic community," to a committee for a more
complete review.
In his e-mail, Mr. Woodwell acknowledged that he is advocating taking "an outlandishly aggressively
partisan approach" but said scientists have had their "classical reasonableness" turned against
them.
"We are dealing with an opposition that is not going to yield to facts or appeals from people who
hold themselves in high regard and think their assertions and data are obvious truths," he wrote."
    @none: ""Eric Gisin" <email_address> wrote in
news:hmrmg5$aq8$<email_address>: 
<quote>
Meanwhile, his good communist buddies in China and Russia had already 
killed over 100 million by that time.  He should have factored that in."
    @georgeswk: "<quote>
and;
Karmageddon?
I'm sure everyone realizes that if you don't take care of your home. It 
may deteriorate to a point that you can't live there anymore.
And we may be looking at human caused environmental destruction of the 
earth biosphere .  Yes, it is possible for the humans to go extinct. And 
take many other species with us.  But, not all is lost . the earth can 
regenerate a bit. And maybe even a slow recovery. The Earth will Heal.
Rejoice in that! ok?
Money; What a Concept !"
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